Talk:Free attack
Full BAB and Polymorph Merge Anomaly Apparently, unarmed polymorph forms get all the benefits of the additional attacks (like Haste's +AC & Divine Power's strength adjustment) EXCEPT the full BAB. For those with monk levels, the BAB of the additional attacks continues to decrease at a -3AB rate (eg. a hasted monk dragon under the influence of Divine Power and attacking with Flurry of Blows would exhibit a BAB schedule of 25-22-19-16-13-10-7-4 rather than 25-22-19-16-13-25-20-15) while non-monk unarmed polymorphs use the -5AB schedule. This has only been tested for several of the druid and shifter shapes, not the forms from standard or epic spells, though I suspect it may be consistent. The armed forms like Kobold Commando & Risen Lord acquire the full BAB extra attack schedule as expected, the same one as the non-polymorphed feat owner experiences. I was unsure whether this anomaly had been mentioned in another article. I've checked the polymorph, extra attack, and all the shapechange feat articles without finding any mention of this fact. I suppose this was not the case in versions prior to v1.69 because I've seen some older character builds which exploited the full attack bonuses especially for dragons, supposedly according to the combat logs used to confirm expectations at that time. I suggest that this anomaly be mentioned wherever it makes the most sense. I have no way to determine if this was the intended dynamic planned by BioWare (mainly, because it changed from version to version) or it is a bug that "slipped through the cracks" of the final release.--Iconclast (talk) 02:23, October 16, 2012 (UTC) * I don't recall this being reported before, but if it is true, I'd suspect it is because of creature weapons, not polymorphing. --The Krit (talk) 20:40, October 16, 2012 (UTC) :* That's disconcerting, TK. I'm sure it IS related to the creature weapon dynamic. I figured either noting it in creature weapons or in the mechanism that exhibits the anomaly (here in Free_attacks). Polymorphing a PC was merely the easiest method to test and record the scope of effect, having direct consequences on character builders. Perhaps they don't routinely run combat debugging for shifted/morphed situations? Dunno. Less significant for module builders since there are many other methods to increase combat effectiveness of NPCs to compensate for the omission of the "standard" benefits of those effects. ::What prompted this (for me) was a seemingly straightforward venture to retrieve a combat schedule of a cleric/druid/monk dragon. The AB's were all over the place, probably due in at least some part to the bite vs. claw randomness, but it became a futile exercise attempting to quantify the potential. Then, focusing specifically on the BAB, the above anomaly was discovered to be consistent across unarmed attacks of all shapes (i.e. those using creature weapons only). It is the obvious selectivity of the engine (only disregarding the full AB portion of the applied effect) that seems illogical to me (though there may be an innate design constraint that forces it). I intend to test unarmed vs. armed familiars next, searching for an exception to this, but expecting none. If uploading a record of the combat log would help certify this, I can furnish that, but the anomaly is actually easy to spot now that it has been identified. I wish I had samples from earlier versions of the game to at least determine when it changed. --Iconclast (talk) 22:34, October 16, 2012 (UTC)